French Manifesto in Response to #MeToo

At Who Is Marc Gafni, next to telling the story of the organized smear campaign against Marc Gafni, we are participating in the evolution of public culture by offering new memes and distinctions around some of the most critical themes of our public discourse, truth, justice, freedom, shame, and sexuality. When we started this website, we had no idea how popular some of these themes would soon become. The #MeToo movement is but one expression of that.

While it is a major evolution of consciousness and culture that women (and men) can publically tell their stories and sexual abuse in all of its forms is outlawed, we also agree with some of the critiques of the #MeToo movement that it went too far in viewing all men as perpetrators and all women as victims.

Recently about 100 prominent French women–artists and intellectuals–have issued an open letter in Le Monde. The letter was co-written by Sarah Chiche (writer/psychoanalyst), Catherine Millet (author/art critic), Catherine Robbe-Grillet (actress/writer), Peggy Sastre (author/journalist) and Abnousse Shalmani (writer/journalist). It was signed by about 100 others. See the full list of signatories.

The letter is criticizing the so-called #MeToo movement that called out inappropriate male behavior that erupted in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal.

From the Translated Manifesto:

PARIS — Rape is a crime. But trying to pick up someone, however persistently or clumsily, is not — nor is gallantry an attack of machismo.

The Harvey Weinstein scandal sparked a legitimate awakening about the sexual violence that women are subjected to, particularly in their professional lives, where some men abuse their power. This was necessary. But what was supposed to liberate voices has now been turned on its head: We are being told what is proper to say and what we must stay silent about — and the women who refuse to fall into line are considered traitors, accomplices!

Just like in the good old witch-hunt days, what we are once again witnessing here is puritanism in the name of a so-called greater good, claiming to promote the liberation and protection of women, only to enslave them to a status of eternal victim and reduce them to defenseless preys of male chauvinist demons.